Dunamis15 Is A Ticket To A Time Loop Adventure

5pb. have quite a few major visual novels (or ADV games as they’re called in Japan) in development at the moment. In addition to Robotics;Notes, they’re working on a remake of Ever17, and this week, they revealed yet another new title via Famitsu.

Titled Dunamis15, this game takes place in the not so distant future. The story involves a time loop, similar to Flower, Sun and Rain or The Legend of Zelda: Majora’s Mask, where you experience the same events over and over again. Progressing through Dunamis15’s story means putting an end to the time loop. This ties in to the game’s main “hook.”

Dunamis15 uses what 5pb call a multi-site system. This refers to the fact that you play through the game while switching between different characters. In addition to this, you’ll also experience the five chapters of Dunamis15’s story from the perspective of five different main characters.

Togo Takatsuki is the lead character. He leads a dull life in the academy on Dumas Base, a lone island. While rushing to class because he slept in, Togo spots a strange girl. After the petite girl and Togo cross eyes, Togo’s life moves away from the mundane in a big way. Togo is about to graduate from school, but isn’t sure what direction his life will go in. Nanami, another playable character, is a ladies man. He’s popular with the girls in Dumas Base and is known for sneaking into the girl’s dorm at night. Hitohana is an honors student and a picturesque beauty. She’s known for being liked by boys and teachers plus her sense of humor. Manami yearns to fall in love and appears to be chasing Togo. Chihaya transferred from the mainland. She has a cool personality and due to a genetic abnormality her growth has been halted.

Unlike other 5pb ADV titles, this one is being developed as a multiplatform game for both the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 from the get-go. Dunamis15 is planned for release this summer.

Man, he looks loke Kyle Hide but younger xD Will be looking forward to this, the VN that 5pb make are pretty cool…

Ps3 and xbox uh?…. hope they port it to psp later on like always

Zero_Destiny

Oh man reminds me of Time Hollow and that Chunsoft game that I won’t name because of spoilers. I want it so bad. :( Sounds cool enough I guess. I like the multiple perspectives it’ll make every loop more interesting. Games like these make me want to sped-up on my pathetic learning of Japanese. But then reading the books make me want to stop. lol Oh well. Maybe someday. :)

Yeah, that’s what I say to myself too, “Maybe someday.~” though this somedays is far more distant than it may seem at first sight. xD
Whatever, I really liked Time Hollow(not sure what the other game is), so if it’s going to be the slightest bit similar then I’m already looking forward to this, not to mention that it would be my first VN on PS3. :D

Zero_Destiny

That someday probably won’t be until I get outta of college sadly. :( Just don’t have the time to really get in good with it. The spoken stuff is starting to make sense to me. But it’s more like I get the general idea not really 100% and watching anime RAW would do nothing for me. Still need the subs. You make me really want to tell you what game. I’m sure once i say it you’ll be all like “Oh I haven’t gotten there yet.” But I can’t. It’s too awesome of a twist. The only VN I’ve played on a home-console was Sakura Wars and that was more like a VN/Mecha Tactics hybrid. Still a great game though. :) Sometimes I sit here wishing that all these console VN’s will get ported to the PC so MangaGamers or a patcher could help us out. Oh well.

Yeah, I won’t start anytime soon myself, too much to do…but I do understand some bits, only if they are spoken though, that’s one of the reasons why voice acting is so important for me in Japanese games. :P
Oh man, now I have to search the internet for that game, but I will find it! >-< True Sakura Wars was a semi VN too(annoyingly had to buy both the Wii and the PS2 version…), but this here seems to be a classic one, with maybe some puzzle solving elements. :D Same here my friend, same here. xd

Zero_Destiny

lol I can spoil it for you and just put SPOILER WARNING in front of it (so to not ruin it for others) but it would ruin the fun the game. If you really want me to though I can.
EDIT: Looking t your massive library you atcually don’t own it which surprises me so much. :P

Hmmmhm I’m really tempted to accept the spoilers, just for the sake of knowing what game that is, but I don’t want anyone elso to be spoiled accidently, so I just leave it at that. xD
Edit: So it’s on one of the consoles I listed? Ok, that actually helps a bit. xD

Infinite recursions of time. That is my fetish.
A shame the chance of an english release of this is pretty much zero.

Yusaku_Matsuda70s

Your fetish? Time loops are my bane. I like closure and conclusion, thank you very much. Not to mention most of the time they are annoyingly depressing.
But if you want to be stuck in one, by all means, I won’t stop you…

But if you want to be stuck in one, by all means, I won’t stop you…
…by all means, I won’t stop you…
…I won’t stop you…
…stop you…
…stop…
…
.

Anythign I have EVER seen that has had time loops have had conclusions. Higurashi? Cross Channel? Fate/Hollow Ataraxia? Kagetsu Tohya? All You Need Is Kill? Groundhog Day? Plenty more, but you get my point.

Augh. Still burned out by that.
[it also doesn’t help the whole ending system was a mess…. to even get a little bit of extra information]

Aoshi00

W/ movies it’s fine, but w/ games sometimes they just feel a bit too repetitive even if you play thru the same events from different perspectives.. I’m a bit burned out by time loop though.. Butterfly Effect and Shadow of Destiny were still my favorite..

Yusaku_Matsuda70s

I was eager to try Shadow of Destiny because I heard good things about it, but as I played the English dub was so terribad I couldn’t take it any longer. It wouldn’t have been a serious problem if the game wasn’t story driven, but the being that kind of game it relies heavily on the performance of its actors.

But I’ll bet you played the perfectly fine Japanese version, as usual. >:D

Aoshi00

Lol.. unfortunately no Jpn dub even for the Jpn ver (Shadow of Memories) to my dismay. Shadow of Destiny only had that cheesy Eng dub in both ver like Resident Evil :) I was curious and actually went thru great lengths to pick up the Jpn ver as well thinking it had a better Jpn dub, but only Jpn subtitle. I don’t know about the recent PSP port, I doubt they redub the Jpn ver either. Yea, the voice acting was kinda bad but back then I didn’t mind it because the story was so engrossing and it was such a quirky game..

Yusaku_Matsuda70s

Ah I guess I am too shallow at times as well… and not open enough to time loops. X)

Yusaku_Matsuda70s

Hahah don’t take me *too* seriously. Everyone is entitled to their fetish. ;) The best thing about time loops are when they END though. I just dislike it during the time they’re stuck and there seems to be no way out. Sometimes being stuck makes the story fun, a lot of the time it doesn’t, in my view. Like Aoshi said, it is usually handled better in movies/ anime than it is in games.

Well yea. That all falls down to if the author can “do it right”. Which then can also be applied to any subject matter that something is based around. Unless it is done right then it is terrible. I guess “infinite recursions of time” just fall under the “Harder to do well” category.

To be honest, this is one of the few VN that 5pb are making that I have no interest in. Something about the character designs… and the plot are throwing me off for some reason.

In either case, this is obviously to gauge interest from the ps3 user base [and of course to gain experience if it’s successful]. Though I do wonder just how much they have to sell to make it worth to begin with. And just for the heck of it, it’s probably going to outsell the 360 version by 4-1.

And as usual, they will probably port it to PC a year later, then PSP afterwards.

That’s what I’ve been trying to do :-p.
Who knows, they might try and unite the user base just to spite the 360, hoho.

Ladius

The only platform that should matter to non-japanese speaking fans should be PC, since we could at least hope for a fantranslation in some years (even if the lack of a project for Steins Gate is sad : ).

Everything related to Nitroplus is licensed by Jast was it?
And they’re still supposedly working on Chaos;head?

Yea, if even that game isn’t out, this is going to take a while!

And I kind of agree on the whole PC platform since there’s no restriction, and there’s a fan community [as long as the translator[s]…. don’t abruptly leave, right?], that may even get official OK. [barring they don’t promote piracy, which most usually don’t].

Again, I would accept ANY miracle. The game I’ve been most curious about that’s getting a remake is PHANTOM [although it’s been delayed for like a year now…], I never played it because of supposedly bad translations and just being bad since you had to play it as DVD game?…Then everything else!

Roses4Aria

I really like the art and the time loop concept intrigues me. I also have to say I like the idea of getting able to play as several different characters, especially as some of them are actually female. I’ll be looking forward to more info about this!

Hm.. I liked 5pb but I’ve played too many games w/ time loop I’m a little burned out, I just don’t like all the repeating and deja vu… I still haven’t finished Infinite Loop on PSP from way back (you also possess diff chars as a ghost and see things from different perspectives).. I haven’t finished Time Hollow either.. still I think the best time loop (other than Groundhog day) was Butterfly Effect for movie and Shadow of Destiny for game.. those two titles had a big impact on me.. other games just don’t feel that engaging.. No more time loop for me.. I’m content just playing the Phoenix and Edgeworth games.. (I’m on the 2nd case of Gyakuten Kenji 2 now playing bit by bit, so far so good)

5pb is so awesome it’s somewhat scary. They are practically dominating the non-nukige visual novel scene at this point.

All this awesomeness, however, translates to unbound frustration for western visual novel fans, since those games will almost surely stay in Japan and without PC ports a fantranslation won’t be feasible :

PrinceHeir

yes thank you 5pb :D

more visual novel games on PS3 is a good thing :P

now if we can have a western version(even if it’s digital download only) i would be soo happy :)